Special wolf agent Jillian
Matthews has joined the jaguar-run United Shifter Force to track down a deadly
criminal. She’s even willing to work with PI Vaughn Greystroke—until the hot,
growly SEAL wolf makes the mistake of getting in her way. Naturally, she shoots
him. Who could blame her?

Vaughn Greystroke has
always worked alone. But when a string of attempted murders puts him in the
crosshairs, teaming up with the Shifter Force begins to sound like a good idea.
Even if he has to work with alluring—and potentially treacherous—Jillian
Matthews. Vaughn is a trained SEAL, after all. He can surely keep his distance
from Jillian...no matter how much she’s getting under his skin.

Formerly an army intelligence officer and
now a PI, Jillian Matthews had agreed to go out with her brother Miles’s friend
as a favor, but man did the guy have octopus arms. Oh sure, he was fun, but way
more interested than she was. The guy several tables over, now he got her
attention. If she didn’t know any better, she’d say he was all wolf, though
some human males showed the same wolfish interest in a woman, even if she was
with someone else. She’d never think about dumping a guy on a date when he was
being nice, especially when it was to pay her brother back for his help in
solving one of her cases. But she’d made sure she said it was only one date,
unless she changed her mind.

Everything about the club was a blast—the
music, drinks, dancers, and atmosphere—yet the man at the other table truly
stole her attention tonight.

“Did you want to return here tomorrow
night?” Miles asked.

She smiled at her brother. She’d love to if
the other guy was going to be here. He
had dark hair, chiseled features, tanned biceps. He was muscular but not
overdone, and had a darkly, intriguing smile that made her melt.

“Sure,” she said, secretly wishing she could
see tall, dark, and intriguing. Maybe tomorrow he would ask her to dance or
she’d ask him. The guy’s own date looked bored and Jillian hadn’t seen him
dance until women began asking him. As soon as a blond did, it was like a
signal to other single women that he was interested and available. If Jillian
had been without a date, even she would have asked him to dance. She’d help him
move that gorgeous body right up close and personal. Her own date wasn’t
interested in dancing with anyone else, so she curbed the inclination. She
could envision hanging onto the guy too, if he still piqued her interest and
not allow any other woman to take a turn with him.

“Hey, you ready to go?” Miles asked,
breaking into her fantasy. “If I’m going to help you on that next case, I need
some sleep.”

His date was a human woman, and Jillian knew
her brother too well. Sleep wasn’t what he had in mind at all.

“Yeah, agreed.”

“I can take you back to your hotel,” her
date said, as if he were looking for some mattress action too.

“Oh, thanks so much, but no, that’s fine.
Miles is right. We have to get up before the crack of dawn.”

She and Miles rose from the table, Jillian’s
date not making a move to leave. “See you tomorrow night then,” he said.

Not if she could help it. She gathered her
sweater and bag, and though she didn’t want to seem too obvious that she was
interested in the other guy, she glanced back at him. He inclined his head a
little to her and her whole body flushed with heat.

He was so hot. Yeah, he was the date she
wanted tomorrow night, whether he had a
date with him or not.

Then suddenly a scream caught Jillian’s
attention. One of the corner chains holding a dancer’s platform had broken
loose, and the dancer on it screamed again. Thank God the dancer had reacted
quickly enough to grab one of the remaining four chains holding it up before
she fell. Dangling twenty feet above the patrons, she clung precariously to the
end of the chain, looking up as if she was thinking of trying to climb up it.
Before Jillian could do anything, the wolfish guy she had been admiring had
climbed the ladder to the platform. He leapt to one of the chains still holding
the platform, and shimmied across the top of it to reach the chain the dancer
was holding onto.

The music was still in heavy jungle beat
mode, most patrons unaware of the potential tragedy unfolding before them.
Jillian rushed to tell a server to get help and to turn off the music so the
guy rescuing the woman could concentrate.

“Hell, that’s part of the show,” the server
said, smiling at her. “You’re not from around here, are you?”

“The guy trying to rescue her is part of it
too?”

The server glanced up at him. “No. Once in a
blue moon we get some hero type that has to show off how macho he is. He must
not be from around here either.”

“He could injure himself! Kill himself
even!”

“Safety nets spring up and will catch them
if they fall. We’ve only had one case where we’ve had to use them, and
everyone, including the would-be hero, loved it.”

Then the man managed to climb down the chain
to the woman and had her crawl up his body. As agile as she was, she probably
could have made it up the chain by herself if the heroic guy hadn’t tried to
rescue her. The dancer wrapped her legs around his waist, her arms around his
neck as he made the treacherous climb up.

Even so, Jillian was practically holding her
breath. The visitor wasn’t part of the show, and any misstep on his part could
mean the two of them could fall. Maybe he knew this was part of the show. Maybe
the waiter didn’t realize it.

The music was still playing, but a lot more
of the patrons had stopped to watch, probably because only once in a blue moon
someone came to the dancer’s rescue.

At the top edge of the platform, the guy
made his way across the wooden edge until he reached the next corner chain. He
paused there for the longest time. The music was still playing, the only lights
the ones highlighting the dancers on their platforms. The other dancers no
longer moved, riveted by their fellow dancer and the heroic guy. If he jumped
to the ladder and missed, that would be the end of the show, and the dancer and
the good Samaritan would fall. What if the net didn’t appear in time?

Jillian wanted to do something, anything to
help him. All she could do was lamely watch and pray he was successful.

USA Today bestselling
author Terry Spear has written over
35 paranormal romances featuring werewolf and jaguar shapeshifters. In 2008, Heart of the Wolf was named a Publishers
Weekly Best Book of the Year. A retired officer of the U.S. Army Reserves,
Terry also creates award-winning teddy bears that have found homes all over the
world and is raising two Havanese puppies. She lives in Spring, Texas.

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